Frank Whaley

A boyishly handsome actor-turned-writer/director, Frank Whaley entered films as the youthful version of Francis Phelan (played as an adult by Jack Nicholson) in "Ironweed" (1987) and again essayed the...
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New Family Members: Get ready to meet the whole Miller clan on New Girl. Not only will we meet Nick’s mom, Bonnie (Margo Martindale), in an upcoming episode, more of Nick’s relatives will pop up too. The League and Kroll Show’s Nick Kroll will guest star as Nick’s dim yet passionate younger brother, an air conditioner repairman named Jamie. Stand-up comedian Bill Burr will play Bobby, Nick’s loudmouth cousin and a TSA agent at Boston’s Logan Airport who is always fighting with Jamie. The Miller-centric episode airs next month, and finds Nick (Jake Johnson) and his roommates traveling to his hometown of Chicago. His friends soon learn that Nick is somehow the most mature member of his family. [EW]
Star Goes Buckwild: MTV's newest reality show, Buckwild, features twentysomethings in rural West Virginia partying and doing reckless things. For star Salwa Amin, the self-proclaimed "Bengali in Boots," life may have just gotten a little too wild. The 24-year-old was arrested on Sunday in a drug raid outside of Charleston, West Virginia. Amin was taken into custody with two other men after an informant tipped off the drug task force that a shipment of narcotics would be delivered to a home. Officers found Amin and two other individuals hiding in a shed outside, and a search subsequently turned up a large quantity of Oxycodone in Amin's purse along with three bags of heroin in the shed. All three were arrested and arraigned on a charge of possession with intent to deliver. They remain in the county jail with bail set at $200,000. No word on how this will affect Amin’s slot in the just-announced second season of Buckwild. [E!]
RELATED: TV Tidbits: Courteney Cox and Matthew Perry Stage 'Friends' Reunion On 'Go On'
Bad Boys, Bad Boys: Andre Braugher will play a cop once again. The former Homicide: Life on the Street star has booked a new pilot. He'll star as a police captain in charge of a diverse group of detectives in an outer New York City precinct. This one's a comedy, though, and Andy Samberg will play one of his screwup subordinates. [Deadline]
House Star Gets Scandalous: Lisa Edelstein has just booked a guest stint on ABC's drama Scandal. The former House star will play a client of Olivia Pope and Associates. [TVLine]
Ray Donovan Books Frank Whaley: Showtime's upcoming drama Ray Donovan has just cast veteran actor Frank Whaley opposite star Liev Schreiber. The drama revolves around a professional "fixer" for the rich and famous in Los Angeles as he balances his work demands and complex family dynamics. Whaley will play Van Miller, an FBI agent investigating illegal activity in Hollywood. The series premieres Sunday, June 30 at 10 PM ET/PT. [THR]
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The first and most important thing you should know about Paramount Pictures’ Thor is that it’s not a laughably corny comic book adaptation. Though you might find it hokey to hear a bunch of muscled heroes talk like British royalty while walking around the American Southwest in LARP garb director Kenneth Branagh has condensed vast Marvel mythology to make an accessible straightforward fantasy epic. Like most films of its ilk I’ve got some issues with its internal logic aesthetic and dialogue but the flaws didn’t keep me from having fun with this extra dimensional adventure.
Taking notes from fellow Avenger Iron Man the story begins with an enthralling event that takes place in a remote desert but quickly jumps back in time to tell the prologue which introduces the audience to the shining kingdom of Asgard and its various champions. Thor (Chris Hemsworth) son of Odin is heir to the throne but is an arrogant overeager and ill-tempered rogue whose aggressive antics threaten a shaky truce between his people and the frost giants of Jotunheim one of the universe’s many realms. Odin (played with aristocratic boldness by Anthony Hopkins) enraged by his son’s blatant disregard of his orders to forgo an assault on their enemies after they attempt to reclaim a powerful artifact banishes the boy to a life among the mortals of Earth leaving Asgard defenseless against the treachery of Loki his mischievous “other son” who’s always felt inferior to Thor. Powerless and confused the disgraced Prince finds unlikely allies in a trio of scientists (Natalie Portman Stellan Skarsgard and Kat Dennings) who help him reclaim his former glory and defend our world from total destruction.
Individually the make-up visual effects CGI production design and art direction are all wondrous to behold but when fused together to create larger-than-life set pieces and action sequences the collaborative result is often unharmonious. I’m not knocking the 3D presentation; unlike 2010’s genre counterpart Clash of the Titans the filmmakers had plenty of time to perfect the third dimension and there are only a few moments that make the decision to convert look like it was a bad one. It’s the unavoidable overload of visual trickery that’s to blame for the frost giants’ icy weaponized constructs and other hybrids of the production looking noticeably artificial. Though there’s some imagery to nitpick the same can’t be said of Thor’s thunderous sound design which is amped with enough wattage to power The Avengers’ headquarters for a century.
Chock full of nods to the comics the screenplay is both a strength and weakness for the film. The story is well sequenced giving the audience enough time between action scenes to grasp the characters motivations and the plot but there are tangential narrative threads that disrupt the focus of the film. Chief amongst them is the frost giants’ fore mentioned relic which is given lots of attention in the first act but has little effect on the outcome. In addition I felt that S.H.I.E.L.D. was nearly irrelevant this time around; other than introducing Jeremy Renner’s Hawkeye the secret security faction just gets in the way of the movie’s momentum.
While most of the comedy crashes and burns there are a few laughs to be found in the film. Most come from star Hemsworth’s charismatic portrayal of the God of Thunder. He plays up the stranger-in-a-strange-land aspect of the story with his cavalier but charming attitude and by breaking all rules of diner etiquette in a particularly funny scene with the scientists whose respective roles as love interest (Portman) friendly father figure (Skarsgaard) and POV character (Dennings) are ripped right out of a screenwriters handbook.
Though he handles the humorous moments without a problem Hemsworth struggles with some of the more dramatic scenes in the movie; the result of over-acting and too much time spent on the Australian soap opera Home and Away. Luckily he’s surrounded by a stellar supporting cast that fills the void. Most impressive is Tom Hiddleston who gives a truly humanistic performance as the jealous Loki. His arc steeped in Shakespearean tragedy (like Thor’s) drums up genuine sympathy that one rarely has for a comic book movie villain.
My grievances with the technical aspects of the production aside Branagh has succeeded in further exploring the Marvel Universe with a film that works both as a standalone superhero flick and as the next chapter in the story of The Avengers. Thor is very much a comic book film and doesn’t hide from the reputation that its predecessors have given the sub-genre or the tropes that define it. Balanced pretty evenly between “serious” and “silly ” its scope is large enough to please fans well versed in the source material but its tone is light enough to make it a mainstream hit.

The Music and Lyrics star exchanged vows with events director Kat Schaufel at Manhattan's Gramercy Park Hotel.
His actor pal Michael Showalter became an ordained minister to preside over the nuptials, which were attended by stars including Ethan Hawke and Frank Whaley, according to the New York Post's gossip column Page Six.

Meeting the Crazy Eights cast we have: Brent (Frank Whaley) an obnoxious self-obsessed nerd; Beth (Gabrielle Anwar) a troubled freakish girl; Gina (Traci Lords) a sexy carefree bimbo; Jennifer (Dina Meyer) a smart sensible girl; and Wayne (Dan DeLuca) the cool handsome guy who all get together when they receive an invitation to the funeral of an old friend. They were brought together for more nefarious reasons however which are revealed when they unearth a trunk that contains a time capsule of items buried two decades ago. The trunk also contains the body of a girl and it's that girl's spirit that ends up haunting them all. A kind of treasure map in the trunk leads them to a barn which in turn guides them to a tunnel to a creepy abandoned hospital. It's there at the hospital where their collective memories recreate what happened to the little girl and why they were really brought together for this funeral-and future funerals to come. The bottom line to this story is: The past never leaves you. In the 8 Films to Die For series of this year's Horrorfest 2007 Crazy Eights definitely contains the most recognizable cast—and it’s hard to remember a low-budget B horror film with a more noteworthy cast including Whaley (Pulp Fiction) Meyer (the Saw series) Gabrielle Anwar (Body Snatchers) DeLuca (HBO’s The Wire) and former porn star Lords. Sure some of the characters are cookie-cutter stereotypes from a typical horror ensemble piece but Whaley plays the jerk well and Lords is practically good at being typecast. DeLuca is also Crazy Eights producer and co-writer and most likely gave himself as the juicier part. He could become a credible leading man in his own right. DeLuca co-wrote the film with horror veteran James Koya Jones and additional rewrites by Ji-un Kown and Patrick Moses and they may have added a few of the twists and turns in the plot but nothing is outstandingly different. The special effects aren't too elaborate and thankfully most of the goriest death scenes are done just off screen and left more to the imagination. The looming abandoned hospital is used to a great extent and allows for some of the best surprise shocks. It's big creepy and haunting and is practically one of the scariest things in the film. And of course any time there's a ghostly little girl you’ve got some chills. Crazy Eights is a keeper.

When a bickering couple is driving on some out-of-the-way interstate late at night in their BMW they’re just begging for trouble—at least in the movies. In Vacancy that couple consists of Amy (Kate Beckinsale) and David Fox (Luke Wilson). It doesn’t take long for their Beemer to break down on them—in fact barely enough time for us to learn a few exposition tidbits: She has spells of Prozac-induced nightmares; he is bothered by those spells; their son’s dead and their marriage has all but dissolved. Once the car finally dies (and we’re sufficiently up to speed on their volatile relationship) Amy and David decide that they have no choice but to pack it in for the night. And so they do at the proverbial cockroach-infested dingy nearby motel. Upon checking in with the sleep-deprived manager (Frank Whaley) they’re a little wary of the place but that only gets worse when they get to the room and hear banging noises on the door and walls. The final hint that something’s awry comes when David watches a videotape of someone being beaten in a room that looks just like theirs. Hey wait a minute…it IS their room! Luke Wilson displayed surprising agility in ‘05’s The Family Stone but apart from that role he has become more or less a slacker icon. With that in mind and his trademark sloooow stoner-resembling Texas drawl Wilson is really not (vocally) fit for suspense. The only less logical choice to play the protagonist in a thriller might be his brother Owen. In Vacancy you can’t help but chuckle and reminisce upon Wilson’s cinematic past while watching him try in vain to go all heroic hubby on us. One might also wonder what Beckinsale gorgeous and famous enough by now to carry her own movie is doing playing a distant second fiddle in what should’ve been a B-movie. But after seeing Vacancy you realize all she had to do for her paycheck was look pretty scream a few damsel-in-distress screams and hide her British accent. Simple enough—and she makes it seem that ho-hum too. But then there’s veteran actor Whaley. I don’t wanna say it’s one of the worst performances of all time—mostly because it’s just a supporting role—but it’s one of those in which it seems like he’s acting in a different movie. He’ll genuinely give you a case of the giggles during his most intense scenes. Frank Whaley? A villain? Come on there had to have been some cheaper scarier actors out there. Vacancy should be an inspiration to all those struggling screenwriters out there. It says in essence if you’re at an artistic crossroads you need only dumb your script down for it to get sold. Of course rookie writer Mark L. Smith is crafty not dumb for curtailing the amount of intelligence in Vacancy so that everything would be crystal clear to scare-hungry audiences. And acclaimed Hungarian director Nimrod Antal (Kontroll) making his American debut does nothing to stand in his way. Together they give the characters—who are fleshed out with traits like antidepressant addiction and short patience—the ol’ Murphy’s Law treatment: Anything that can go wrong will. That’s fine and expected to set things in motion but when that gimmick strings the plot along—very tenuously—it’s downright ridiculous and only appreciated by viewers who go in determined to like a movie. It’s really too bad because Vacancy’s premise is a great starting point for a contemporary psychological thriller. But you’ll know the director wanted to steer clear of depth when early on you see the tapes inexplicably just sitting in Amy and David’s room. “Why?” you’ll ask. Because it sets up the rest of the story that’s why!

New York's famed Chelsea Hotel is crawling with an assortment of creative types and wannabes whose lives are in disarray. These include tortured writer Bud (Kris Kristofferson) who has beaten the bottle but not the blues brought on by love continually going bad. Former paramours Mary (Natasha Richardson) wife Greta (Tuesday Weld) and waitress Grace (Uma Thurman) could cure his terminal loneliness but won't. Other Chelsea residents not faring much better are prolific poetess Audrey (Rosario Dawson) struggling painter Frank (Vincent D'Onofrio) and Crutches (Kevin Corrigan) a druggie hanger-on appropriately on crutches. Also helping support the Chelsea Hotel's rep as a magnet for misfits are out-of-town musicians Terry (Robert Sean Leonard) and Ross (Steve Zahn) who like their company very young. There's also Lynny (Frank Whaley) who does wobbly stand-up at the local club.
It's hard to fault talented actors who have so little to work with. But such seasoned talents as Richardson Thurman D'Onofrio and Zahn deserve better. At least Kristofferson as the tortured writer rings some emotional if familiar truths as does Weld his unlucky wife. These are two vets worth a detour to the Chelsea.
Oscar-nominated actor-turned-director Ethan Hawke has surrounded himself with many of his gifted thesp friends for his directorial debut. But all this directing and acting talent is no match for playwright/screenwriter Nicole Burdette's pretentious messy riff on the iconoclastic Chelsea characters and their questionable art. Hawke counters the mostly verbal tedium with seemingly random cross-cutting among the quirky Chelsea wannabes. Technically "Chelsea Walls" advertises some of digital video's shortcomings like graininess and a resistance to reds. But Hawke also exploits the medium for its strengths--spontaneity funkiness and intimacy. Hawke another wide-eyed filmmaker entertaining himself with wonderful digital toys forgets that he also has to entertain an audience.

Catherine Zeta-Jones knows how important trust is.
The new Mrs. Michael Douglas will star in the thriller "Trust," a project that is said by Daily Variety to be in the vein of 1987's "Fatal Attraction."
Originally a British miniseries, "Trust" will follow a lawyer living in New York who discovers that her psychiatrist hubby is having an affair with one of his patients.
KING OF THE 'CASTLE': "The Legend of Bagger Vance" helmer and actor Robert Redford might return to the front of the camera in "The Castle," a drama directed by "The Contender's" Rod Lurie, Variety says.
The project, which centers on an imprisoned five-star general as he rallies other prisoners into a mutiny, is also in discussions with Mark Wahlberg for a co-starring role.
'SHOW' TIME: Variety also says that Ethan Hawke, Carla Gugino and Frank Whaley have all signed on to the indie flick "The Jimmy Show," about a New Jersey guy who embarks on a doomed career in stand-up comedy.
Hawke's last screen role was in last year's "Hamlet" with Julia Stiles.
'BARK' IF YOU'RE HAPPY: Lisa Kudrow, Hank Azaria and Vincent D'Onofrio will star in the romantic comedy "Bark," Variety tells us. The film is about a young woman who has a nervous breakdown and believes that she's a dog.
'GUEST' LIST: "That '70s Show" dude Ashton Kutcher might star in the film "The Guest," The Hollywood Reporter says.
Kutcher -- who will be seen in the upcoming "Dude, Where's My Car?" alongside "Road Trip's" Seann William Scott -- would play a guy who tries to woo the daughter of his boss in the new project.
SHALL WE 'DANCE': James Coburn might join Cuba Gooding Jr. in the adventure pic "Winterdance," the Reporter informs. Based on the 1994 novel by Gary Paulsen, the story is an autobiographical account of the writer's participation in a gruesome dogsled race in Alaska.
Gooding will play the part of the dogsled racer and Coburn would play his estranged father.
LAST ROUND: Mykelti Williamson might play boxing promoter Don King in the "Ali" biopic, the Reporter says. The project stars Will Smith as the titular boxer and is expected to go into production next month.

Two friends (Jon Cryer and Rick Stear) find out that their missing high-school chum (Rafael Baez) is now insane and living at New York's decaying Coney Island amusement park. Naturally the guys ditch work and set out in search of their bud and spend an inordinate amount of time wandering around the ramshackle landmark talking to a weirdo skeeball guy (Frank Whaley). Over time one guy confronts his own alcoholism and the other deals with family problems. Oh yeah and they find their nutty friend.
This one's got a lot of indie cred: Whaley and Ione Skye have been doing the little-movie thing for years now and Cryer is a veteran of Schenkman's "Pompatus." The best performance is from Baez an up-and-coming actor whose depiction of mental illness (not an easy thing to do) is pretty disturbing.
This is the latest from Richard Schenkman best known for the equally talky and lethargic "The Pompatus of Love " which also was about guys in their 30s (finally) confronting adulthood. Schenkman's style of writing a directing is slow introspective and ultimately more suited to the confines of a small theater stage than the camera lens.

Title

Reteamed with Hawke as co-star of "The Jimmy Show"; also wrote and directed; screened at Sundance

Made TV-movie debut, "Unconquered" (CBS) with Dermot Mulroney

Acted in the comedy feature "Drillbit Taylor," starring Owen Wilson

Portrayed Craig Sheffer's brother in TNT's "The Desperate Trail"

First screen collaboration with Oliver Stone, "Born on the Fourth of July" playing Tom Cruise's best friend, a clean-cut Long Island boy who comes back from a tour in Vietnam as a brain-damaged heroin addict

Earned critical success with "Swimming With Sharks" as the hapless assistant to a powerful movie agent (Kevin Spacey, who also co-produced)

Acted opposite Abigail Breslin in "Janie Jones"

Appeared in Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction" as the college student gunned down by Samuel L Jackson

Thanks to an Education Opportunity Program (for inner-city kids) sponsored by Jimmy Carter, received a stipend, his books and his college education

Acted in "My Brother's Keeper" segment of Showtime's "Dead Man's Gun"

Performed in summer stock

Associate produced and starred in "Homage," adapted by Mark Medoff from his play The Homage That Follows

Played the young Archie "Moonlight" Graham in "Field of Dreams"; Burt Lancaster was the older version

Appeared uncredited as an Oswald impostor in Stone's "JFK"; role cut in released version but restored for director's cut

Began acting in high school

Feature directorial and screenwriting debut, "Joe the King"; premiered at the Sundance Film Festival; Kilmer portrayed Joe's bad-tempered, alcoholic father, and Hawke played guidance counselor Len Coles; John Leguizamo also acted and served as an executiv

Co-starred with Sam Shepard in "Ruffian," an ESPN-produced TV movie based on the legendary racehorse

Provided a brilliant cameo as Skee-ball Weasel in the nostalgiac "Went to Coney Island on a Mission From God ... Be Back by Five"

TV series debut as regular on the CBS drama "Buddy Faro"; took the job in order to help finance his feature directing debut ("I was counting on the idea that we'd be cancelled after 12 episodes, and ideally, it was." – Time Out New York, Oct. 14-21

Returned the favor by appearing in Hawke's directorial debut "Chelsea Walls"

As co-star of "The Freshman," helped Matthew Broderick's character import a Komodo dragon for the mob

Appeared in "Soldier Boys," a "CBS Schoolbreak Special"

Co-starred with Robert Sean Leonard and Christian Bale in "Swing Kids"

Reteamed with Mulroney for the John Hughes-scripted and produced "Career Opportunities"

Feature debut in "Ironweed," playing the youthful version of Jack Nicholson's character

Co-starred as the central villain in the horror feature "Vacancy"

Summary

A boyishly handsome actor-turned-writer/director, Frank Whaley entered films as the youthful version of Francis Phelan (played as an adult by Jack Nicholson) in "Ironweed" (1987) and again essayed the teenaged version of another screen icon, this time Burt Lancaster, in the Oscar-nominated "Field of Dreams" (1989). These turns plus his harrowing portrayal of a heroin-addicted Vietnam vet in Oliver Stone's "Born on the Fourth of July" (also 1989) helped him land his first leading role in "Cold Dog Soup" (1990), a bizarre "After Hours"-clone requiring him to perform CPR on an expired hound, which unfortunately ran out of steam halfway through. Whaley continued to shine as a supporting player in Andrew Bergman's "The Freshman" (also 1990), helping Matthew Broderick import a Komodo dragon for the mob, and as guitarist Robby Krieger in Stone's biopic "The Doors" (1991) but stumbled as the likable, lying lead of the John Hughes-written-and-produced "Career Opportunities" (also 1991), an idea insufficient to stretch to feature length.

Name

Role

Comments

Josephine Timilione

Mother

Whaley says she married his father because "she wanted a little danger . . . the pain and pleasure kind of mangled her"

Robert Whaley

Father

died of alcohol-related illness c. 1989

Robert Whaley

Brother

older; co-founded band The Niagras with Whaley; had a role in "Joe the King" (1999); also wrote, performed, produced and engineered music for it

Education

Name

Actors Studio

State University of New York, Albany

Notes

Whaley was one of the co-founders (with Ethan Hawke, Robert Sean Leonard, and others) of the now-defunct Malaparte Theater Company. He also co-founded the Naked Angels theater group.

On rumors that Val Kilmer had everyone on "The Doors" set call him by his character's name: "Actually, we all stayed in character during the shooting of the movie--except when we had to piss. I didn't have to address Val as 'Jim Morrison', but I did refer to him as 'c--------r' a couple times. Seriously, Val's so amazing in the movie, I've been thinking about changing my name to Frank Whaley-Kilmer." --Frank Whaley quoted in Movieline, c. 1991

"Sherwood Anderson said that no one knows the chair of loneliness more than a child. That's what I remember most about my childhood--being alone all the time, being sad and lonely." --Whaley to Time Out New York, October 14-21, 1999

"I worked with a wide range of directors, and the ones that are the least successful--not from a box-office standpoint, but from my point-of-view--are the ones who knew the least about acting. What they don't acknowledge is that acting's the most important thing on the screen. Whenever I walk away from a movie I love, I remember the performances. With my film, people come up and say 'I loved your film--that kid [Noah Fleiss] is amazing.' And I think that's the key.

"There are very simple ways of handling actors, where you'll get the maximum amount of results. And a lot of directors don't know those little tricks, those ways of doing it--keeping an even keel on the set, keeping them relaxed and comfortable. And allowing them to trust you, the director. In 'Joe the King', the subject matter was emotionally draining. But the actors always knew that I knew where they were going, where they should be going. I think that helped them." --Whaley quoted in Newsday, October 13, 1999

"I really hate film acting. I despise it. I did a couple of movies that were challenging, but for the most part you get up, you go to work and you sit around all day. You smoke and you drink coffee and for four seconds you go in front of the camera and you second-guess yourself all day." --Whaley to Dallas Morning News, October 17, 1999

About trying to get "Joe the King" made: "I was very naive and I thought I could send it to Oliver Stone, Jersey Films, James L Brooks--people that I had relationships with. But they were like, you need to send it to a smaller company. Even Shooting Gallery and Good Machine--it's so hard, it's so hard out there. Even for a guy like me, you'd think would have it easy with a lot of experience in show business. But it was just really, really difficult every step of the way." --Whaley quoted in Indiewire (www.indiewire.com), February 21, 1999

"I wrote about what I knew. I had quite a criminal record before I turned 18. I stole because I needed things, because I grew up very poor. My movie is the Disney version, really, of the brutal environment I grew up in. And yet I consider the movie a love poem to my mother." --Whaley to Jami Bernard in Daily News, October 14, 1999

On casting friend Ethan Hawke in "Joe the King": "Ethan came in 15 pounds overweight and smelling like a cheese sandwich that had been left in a trunk in August. His wife [Uma Thurman] was nine months pregnant, and honestly, I didn't know who was pregnant between the two of them.

"I said, y'know, buddy, you're fat! It's gone right to your butt! You could show 'The Godfather' on that butt! He said, do these pants make me look fat? No, Ethan, it's your BUTT! I hadn't slept much either, but I didn't have a BUTT THE SIZE OF PEEKSKILL!" --Whaley in Daily News, October 14, 1999